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Micebook: turning a new page

Upon first glance, Micebook may come across as another venue-finding platform. Be assured: it is not. Micebook is more than that. It is a digital community and hub for knowledge exchange. Agencies and inhouse corporate event planners sign up, free, to access the platform and through it can access a tested database of suppliers based on their own company’s experiences.

The platform provides users with bespoke content, with reviews and tips on destinations; a useful tool for time-poor event planners.

To learn more, I met up with Micebook’s CEO and founder Chetan Shah and client services director Zoe Cook.

“Micebook is a digital hub for event planners that helps them find global suppliers from all over the world, from convention bureaux, DMCs, hotels, venues and airlines,” says Shah. “It aims to provide inspiration from venue guides and experience guides. Mostly it’s a place to store knowledge for eventprofs about all that destination and supplier intel which they can share in a closed-network with their teams.”

Shah adds: “We are definitely not a venue-finding platform. Of course, we can help search and look for venues, but essentially, we are there to help planners with the information they gain from trade shows, supplier meetings, and showcases. We provide a platform where it is at your fingertips, where you can access it and share that great intel with your colleagues who might need it in the future.”

While chatting, Cook makes a good point: it is not that event professionals are time poor these days, as such, it’s more a case of the processes changing. More is expected of them in return for less, and a lot of event professionals are still using outdated, manual processes. How can a tool like Micebook help people adapt their processes for the modern age? “I think it is just the fact that the industry has grown obviously, there are so many more suppliers out there, options, publications, venue-finding etc,” says Cook. “We offer a holistic solution across a global landscape. Micebook brings everything together in one place, making the time-consuming parts of the job, like manually sourcing suppliers, redundant.”

This is an obvious solution to a problem many people don’t realise they have. People working in an office won’t always know if their organisation has worked with certain suppliers before. Micebook changes that, allowing everyone to chart the experiences with each supplier.

So, what does the future look like for Micebook? Shah is keen to push forward with transactional technology, allowing payments to pass through safely. However, his big aim rests on someone successfully cracking the issue of live availability. “In many cases, some people don’t want to put out an RFP,” says Shah. “You want to find instant availability, check the prices, put your credit card in, and book. So, we’re looking for those technology integrations to make the site richer.”

With 10,000 users already using Micebook, its usefulness speaks for itself.